The steel industry has its own specific language. This glossary should help to better understand the terminology used.

Agglomeration is a process of size enlargement. Stitching, sintering and pelletizing are the three most commonly used processes in the metallurgical industry. The required particle size for sintering is much coarser (usually up to 10 mm) than that for pelletizing, which is usually smaller than 0.1 mm.

Metal aging is one of the most common ways to change the properties of a metal alloy. Although the properties of many metals can change by heating and quenching or by hardening, some metal alloys are specifically made to age. Aging can change the physical and aesthetic properties of an alloy such that it takes on properties that are quite different from its unaged form.

AISI (American Iron and Steel Institute) The American Iron and Steel Institute is a trade association of North American steel producers. Including its predecessors, it is one of the oldest trade associations in the United States, dating back to 1855.

An alloy steel is a steel alloyed with more than one element (alloying elements) and these are added to increase strength, hardness, wear resistance and toughness. The added alloying elements added to the iron and carbon structure usually do not exceed 5% of the material composition of the alloy steel.

Steel deoxidized with aluminum to reduce the oxygen content, intended to eliminate any reaction between carbon and oxygen during solidification.

Annealing is a heat treatment process that changes the microstructure of a material to alter its mechanical or electrical properties. In steel, annealing is typically used to reduce hardness, increase ductility and eliminate internal stresses.

The AOD (argon, oxygen, decarburization) process is the first manufacturing process for stainless steels in which the treatment time in a converter under atmospheric conditions corresponds to the casting time of a sheetfiller for many steels.

Austenitic steel is a type of stainless steel that contains austenite. It contains a high percentage of nickel and chromium, allowing it to be easily formed and welded into any shape and offering great strength and resistance to corrosion. This type is the most popular and beneficial metal for industrial purposes.

Hydraulic roller force systems allow steelmakers to precisely control the thickness of their steel slabs as they move through the cold rolling mill at more than 50 miles per hour. Using feedback or feed-forward systems, a computer sensor adjusts the distance between the roller's reduction rolls 50-60 times per second. These adjustments prevent the processing of steel sheets of varying thickness.

A finished steel product, usually in flat, square, round or hexagonal shapes. Bars are rolled from billets and produced in the two main types of commercial steel and specialty steel.

A bake-hardening steel is a steel that increases its yield stress during a paint stripping operation after forming through a strain-hardening process. Thus, in its delivered state, the steel has the ductility of a steel with relatively low strength, but the performance during service of a steel with higher yield stress.

Is a method of primary steelmaking in which carbon-rich molten pig iron is made into steel. Blowing oxygen through the molten pig iron reduces the carbon content of the alloy and turns it into low-carbon steel. The process is known as alkaline because fluxes of calcium oxide or dolomite, which are chemical bases, are added to promote the removal of impurities and protect the cladding of the converter.

Billets are solid pieces of metal with a square or circular cross section, such as a steel billet. They can be made of virtually any type of metal or alloy and in virtually any size to fit the part and production specifications. Billets are produced by continuous casting or hot rolling.

Blanking is a steelmaking process in which a flat, geometric shape is created by feeding a roll of sheet metal into a press and die. In this process, the blank is stamped out of a large metal sheet.

A blast furnace is a steel cylinder with refractory lining. It operates continuously until the lining wears off, which takes many years. The term blast furnace comes from the hot air blown into the lower part of the furnace at very high temperatures.

A bloom is a semi-finished product produced by a continuous casting process (bloom caster) to be used in the production of heavy structural long products and rails. Blooms can have a square or rectangular cross section with sides ranging from 200 to 600 mm.

A burr is a raised edge or small piece of material formed by a machining process that remains on the edge of a workpiece. Burrs are created by machining processes, such as slitting, and are often removed because these exposed sharp edges can be dangerous to handle and, in some production situations, complicate manufacturing.

Busheling is een hoogwaardige kwaliteit schrootstaal dat bekend staat om zijn zuiverheid en verontreinigingsvrijheid. Busheling kan verder worden onderverdeeld in gieterij- en walskwaliteit.

By replacing the coking coal traditionally used in iron ore-based steel production with fossil-free electricity and hydrogen, the process produces steel with virtually no carbon footprint.

If a balance can be achieved between the greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere from steel production and the emissions removed from the atmosphere by sinks, the resulting steel can be called carbon neutral steel. Producing carbon-neutral steel may require offsets in other sectors to achieve true neutrality, and it is important that if producers claim to be carbon neutral, they are transparent about the limits, their accounting methods, and the quality and credibility of the offsets used.

Carbon steel is a common type of steel that is an alloy of iron and carbon. It has higher carbon content, lower melting point and greater durability compared to stainless steel. Carbon steel is the most widely used engineering and construction material for large-scale industrial applications, including ship structures, power plants, transportation, chemical processing and petroleum production and refining.

Carburizing is a process of converting low-carbon steel to high-carbon steel. This is done by exposing it to a carbon-rich atmosphere. Generally, products are carburized in furnaces, vessels and other closed entities.

In steel casting, molten steel is poured into a mold. The castings are given the shape needed for the specific design of the product being made. Unlike iron, steel is difficult to melt. Today, steel casting is used to improve a wide variety of industries, including agriculture, construction, automotive, aerospace, gas and oil, mining and shipping.

Clean steel is a technical expression used in the steel industry to refer to steels with low levels of impurities, oxides, inclusions or low or ultra-low carbon dissolved in the metal.

Metallurgical coal, also known as coking coal, is used to produce coke, the primary source of carbon used in the production of steel. Metallurgical coal differs from thermal coal, which is used for energy and heating, by its carbon content and coking power.

Coils of steel are long, thin sheets of steel used in a variety of applications. They are produced by rolling steel at high temperatures and can be found in various industries, such as construction, automotive and appliance manufacturing.

Coke has a dual role in the steelmaking process. First, it provides the heat needed to melt the ore and second, when burned, it has the effect of “stealing” the oxygen from the iron ore, leaving only the pure iron. In the coking plant, coal is heated to 1250°C in the absence of oxygen.

Cold rolling is a hardening process used to change the structure of metals and is often used to machine stainless steel. Cold-rolled stainless steel as a raw material has a wide range of applications in the medical, aerospace and automotive industries.

Compact Strip Production (CSP) is a new technology developed in 1980s for casting-heat rolling of thin slabs. It is a new technological innovation following converter steel production and continuous casting technology in the steel industry. This technology offers a more compact line and a simpler procedure compared to traditional hot rolling technology.

Continuous casting, also known as strand casting, is the process of heating a metal until it liquefies. The molten metal is then allowed to solidify until it becomes a semi-finished product that is later rolled in the finishing mill. It is used to cast metals of continuous length.

Steel in the first solid state after melting, suitable for further processing or for sale, synonymous with raw steel.

Direct reduction is the removal (reduction) of oxygen from iron ore in solid form. This technology includes a broad group of processes based on different raw materials, furnaces, reducing agents, etc.

These furnaces are usually filled with scrap steel. They use high-power electric arcs to melt the scrap steel. They also directly convert reduced iron into liquid steel, achieving the same quality as in an integrated steel mill. The electric arc furnace creates valuable slag as a byproduct, as does the blast furnace.

Electrical steel is a unique product used in a wide range of industries. Also known as silicon steel and laminated steel, this material has excellent magnetic properties, making it ideal for use in such applications as generators, motors and transformers. Electrical steel also reduces power losses, increases the efficiency of electrical devices and reduces energy consumption. However, the exact formulation for electrical steel must be tailored to produce specific magnetic properties for specific applications.

• Steel manufacturing produces more CO2 than any other heavy industry, comprising around 8% of total global emissions.
• Efforts are under way to move steel production away from coal-fired furnaces to ones powered by electricity or hydrogen.
• But producing green steel is an expensive process - and the industry needs to scale up rapidly to hit net-zero targets.

Flat steel products are commonly known as steel sheet and coil sheet. These are divided into several types, including hot-rolled wide strip (HRC), cold-rolled wide strip (CRC), metallic coated steel, organic coated steel, coil plate and reversible roller plate.

SSAB aims to launch the world's first fossil-free steel on a commercial scale around 2026. Although the greener version of the metal is currently the hottest topic in the steel market, there is still a lot of uncertainty about it. To answer some of the key questions, the Swedish company recently hosted a webinar packed with facts: “What is fossil-free steel and when will production start?

Galvanizing is one of the most widely used to methods for protecting metal from corrosion. It involves applying a thin coating of zinc to a thicker base metal, helping to shield it from the surrounding environment.

The main difference between hot and cold rolled steel is the way they are processed. Hot rolled steel is steel that has been rolled at high temperatures, while cold rolled steel is essentially hot rolled steel that is further processed into cold reduction materials. This involves cooling the material, followed by annealing and/or tempering. Steels of various qualities and specifications can be hot or cold rolled.

The molten steel is poured into the mold through a ladle to form an ingot. After the molten steel is melted in the steel furnace, it needs to be cast into ingots or billets of a certain shape before processing. The technological process of casting an ingot with a mold is called ingot for short.

ISP produces hot-rolled coils with a final thickness of 1 mm and has its origins in the joint development of Arvedi and the German machine builder Mannesmann Demag at the end of the 1980s.

Large-scale plant combining iron smelting and steelmaking facilities, usually based on basic oxygen furnace. May also include systems for turning steel into finished products.

The primary raw material in the manufacture of steel.

The process whereby conditions (temperature, pressure and chemistry) are controlled within the ladle of the steelmaking furnace to improve productivity in preceding and subsequent steps, as well as the quality of the final product.

Used by the steel industry to remove impurities from the iron made in blast furnaces. Limestone containing magnesium, called dolomite, is also sometimes used in the purifying process.

A type of finished rolled steel product like rail and steel bars.

Low-carbon steel is manufactured using technologies and practices that result in the emission of significantly lower emissions than conventional production.

A small-scale steelmaking plant based on the EAF, making new steel from mostly steel scrap. May also include facilities for producing finished steel products.

A process for making steel from molten iron and scrap. The open hearth furnace has a shallow hearth and roof that help to remove impurities from the molten iron. The flame and gases pass across the top of the enclosed hearth, heat being reflected down onto the material in the hearth. This process has been replaced by the basic oxygen process in most modern facilities.

An enriched form of iron ore shaped into small balls.

Using chemicals to remove the scale from finished steel.

The product that results from smelting iron ore with a high-carbon fuel such as coke

A flat-rolled product from slabs or ingots of greater thickness than sheet or strip.

A reinforcing steel bar

A stage in the process of making crude steel, during which the crude steel is further refined (i.e. most residual impurities are removed) and additions of other metals may be made before it is cast.

The initial stages in the process of reducing the thickness of steel slabs.

Equipment that reduces and transforms the shape of semi-finished or intermediate steel products by passing the material through a gap between rolls that is smaller than the entering materials.

The heavy rust that forms on the surface of steel while it is kept hot during rolling, forging, etc.

Steel scrap is one of the steel industry’s most important raw materials. It comes from all steel-containing products that reach the end of their life (post-consumer scrap), from demolished structures to end of life vehicles, packaging, white goods and machinery, and the yield losses in the steelmaking and manufacturing processes (pre-consumer scrap). It can also include iron scrap. All steel can be recycled into new steel. All new steel contains some steel scrap.

Steel products such as billet, blooms and slabs. These products can be made by direct continuous casting of hot steel or by pouring the liquid steel into ingots, which are then hot rolled into semi-finished products.

A flat-rolled product over 12 inches in width and of less thickness than plate.

Rolled sections with interlocking joints (continuous throughout the entire length of the piece) on each edge to permit being driven edge-to-edge to form continuous walls for retaining earth or water.

A plant in which iron ore is crushed, homogenised and mixed with limestone and coke breeze and then cooked (“sintered”) to form sinter which is the main ferrous component of blast furnace burden.

A process that combines ores too fine for efficient blast furnace use with flux stone. The mixture is heated to form clumps, which allow better draft in the blast furnace.

A semi-finished steel product obtained by rolling ingots on a rolling mill or processed through a continuous caster and cut into various lengths. The slab has a rectangular cross section and is used as a starting material in the production process of flat products, i.e. hot rolled coils or plates.

A co-product, containing inert materials from the ‘burden’ (the materials put into the blast furnace at the beginning of the steelmaking process), that is produced during the melting process.

Smelting is a metallurgical term meaning to extract a metal from its ore by melting the ore. Melting is simply the process of changing from a solid to a liquid state due to the application of high heat.

The product of the direct reduction process. Also known as direct reduced iron (DRI).

Stainless steels are distinguished from carbon steel by their chromium (ferritic steel) content and, in certain cases, nickel (austenitic steel). Adding chromium to carbon steel makes it more rust and stain-resistant, and when nickel is added to chromium stainless steel it enhances its mechanical properties, for example its density, heat capacity and strength.

Step Up is worldsteel’s 4-stage efficiency review process. Step Up aims to improve the efficiency of steel production now, to support our members in operating their sites at a level of performance commensurate with the world’s most efficient sites. Step Up is a transitional programme and should not be seen as providing a solution to the steel industry’s climate change challenges.

A continuous length of steel produced in a mill, prior to cutting and/or shaping into finished or semi-finished products.

Flat steel coil products, with widths of less than 600mm for hot rolled products and less than 500mm for cold-rolled products. The wider flat products are called wide strips.

Rolled flange sections, sections welded from plates, and special sections with at least one dimension of their cross-section three inches or greater. Included are angles, beams, channels, tees and zeds.

Steel shaped for use in construction.

To make something harder through heating.

Casting technology that takes liquid steel and casts it into solid strip in one step, thereby eliminating the need for a continuous slab caster and hot strip mill.

Cold rolled sheet, strip or plate coated with tin or chromium.

True steel use (TSU) is obtained by subtracting net indirect exports of steel from apparent steel use (ASU). Total TSU is not equal to ASU because of differences in country coverage and methodological specifics of indirect trade in steel calculations. Further details can be found at worldsteel.org/publications/reports.

Coiled bars of up to 18.5 millimetres in diameter, used mainly in the production of wire.

The broad range of products produced by cold reducing hot-rolled steel through a die, series of dies, or through rolls to improve surface finish, dimensional accuracy and physical properties.

Low-carbon content iron that is tough and malleable for forging and welding.

To be truly zero-carbon, steel would need to be produced without any CO2 emissions at all. This is a very high bar to reach, and it is difficult to conceive of a production technology that could achieve this in the short term.